Saturday, February 03, 2007

A Picture of Tim

My friend Tim Sebastion is dead. He died on Thursday the 1st of February at about 8 o’clock in the evening.

Typical Tim: a pagan to his last breath. He always knew how to make a dramatic exit. It was a glorious full moon, the night before Imbolg, the perfect moment for the founder and ex-Archdruid of the Secular Order of Druids to depart this life and to move on to whatever may await us next.

He was born in Southend-on-Sea in Essex on the 29th April 1947. He was brought up in a Catholic Monastery in Mayfield in Sussex from the age of 8 until he ran away at the age of 15 to seek his fortune in London, where he was a barrow boy in the East End. During the ‘60s Tim ran boutiques in both Carnaby St. and the Kings Road. He also opened his own stall in Portobello Road selling antiques, paintings and prints. In the early ‘70s he worked for the London Music Store in Great Portland Street where he was responsible for importing Melodiya Records from Russia. He was involved with the London hippie scene and knew many of the bands, including Hawkwind and the Pink Fairies.

It was during this time that he attended the first Windsor Free Festival in August 1971. He was amazed at the scene and became a regular at most free festivals from then on. In the mid-seventies, he started going to the Stonehenge festival. He always claimed to be an original Wally: that is, one of the associates of Wally Hope, who organised the first festival in June 1974. It was here, at the Stonehenge festival, that Tim must have seen his first Druids.

Who can say what drew him to them? In the early days of the festival the mainly hippie/anarchist audience were somewhat sceptical of the berobed and besuited, neatly trimmed and clean shaven figures who would drive in to Stonehenge on the morning of the solstice to do their rituals and then depart. In those days the Druids were definitely members of the establishment.

One of the jokes was that, as the Druids were intoning their incomprehensible, nasal mantras, the hippies would all chant back “ken barlowwwwwwwwwwwwwwe... ken barlowwwwwwwwwwwwwe” after the character in Coronation Street who was known to be a Druid and to attend these meetings.

So they were straight guys, middle-aged and middle-class. But then they were also dedicated enough to get up at some ungodly hour and to travel to the stones in time for the sunrise. And didn’t they, too, just like Tim and his compatriots, recognise the importance of the stones to the magical and cultural history of the British Isles? Weren’t they, too, caught up in the mystery of this place?

It took a few years for Tim to adopt the Druid ways, but the seeds of his later conversion lay in those early days: in watching the mysterious strangers in their robes and hoods, with their sickles and their staves and their oak laurels, processing into the stones to perform their arcane ceremonies.

It was also around this time, that Tim decided to move out of London – to “go west young man” – in the spirit of magical adventure, certain that out here, in the mysterious and still superstitious regions of the west country, he would find his true destiny at last.

He opened an antiques shop in Bradford-on-Avon. Later he joined the folk rock band Gryphon, as the lyricist, with whom he made two albums and six singles. (http://www.gaudela.net/gryphon/)

It was during the making of their last album that he first heard the Sex Pistols. They were working down the hall, a just few doors away at the same studio, making the notorious and never-to-be-forgotten Never Mind The Bollocks.

That noise! That sound! It was an instant conversion.

He became a fan of punk music and a friend to many of the aspiring west country groups, including the Subhumans, considered by many to be one of the greatest of the British punk bands.

So how did he become a Druid?

He used to say to me that one day he planned to write a book called How To Be A Druid.

He said, “first of all you have to go to school in a Catholic Monastery. Then you have to run away to London and open a boutique...”

In other words, he saw the whole of his previous life as preparation for his Druidic role.

But undoubtedly partly it was a political response to the establishment attack upon the festival, which was shut own in a storm of police-led violence in June of 1984.

The Druids had a customary right to perform their ceremonies at Stonehenge at the solstice. Everyone had a customary right to freedom of worship, to freedom of movement, and to freedom of assembly. So why not: why not become a Druid? Being a Druid meant standing up for the rights of the British people to worship where they liked, and how they liked and in whatever manner they liked.

It was a political as well as a spiritual decision.

And so he set about creating his own Druid order, the Secular Order of Druids, sometime in the late eighties.

Typical Tim. Always a prankster. Read the acronym. It was a brilliant joke. But also, by giving it that name, by underlining its secular nature, he was making a political and a spiritual statement, about his reasons for making this move.

Secular, meaning not religious. Secular, meaning concerned with worldly as opposed to other-worldly things. Temporal. Down to earth. Mundane.

It’s a statement about the nature of true spirituality, and a reminder to all of those who would be likely to follow him not to try to make a religion out of it.

Just in case he got too pompous himself.

Not that that was ever likely. Tim was just about the least pompous man I ever met.

What I remember about him most was his grumbling voice, his booming laugh, his ribald and unrestrained sense of humour, and his ability, almost stretching to genius, to knock over any ashtray, any pint, any table or any tent that he was even vaguely associated with.

When Tim had an ashtray it was a purely symbolic item. No ash would ever stay in it. You might as well have told him, “just drop it on the floor,” because that’s where it would all end up.

This was the reason I referred to him in my book, The Last of the Hippies, as “the most completely useless person I have ever met”.

To quote, from Chapter 13, The Trouble With Hippies:

“I had Tim with me. I like Tim. He's the most completely useless person I have ever met. Every time he puts up a tent, it falls down. If he has a drink he spills it. If he flicks his ash at the ashtray, the ashtray goes on the floor. Then he'll tread in it too....

“Actually I'd said that to him at the time. I'd said that he was the most completely useless person I'd ever met. We were sitting in the van at the Big Green Gathering, Tim and I, with a pint of that potent cider in front of each of us, smoking fags and chatting, when Tim flicked his cigarette at the ashtray. The ashtray was already surrounded by fag-butts and ash where he's missed it previously. He missed it again, but caught it with his knuckle in the process, and the ashtray went on the floor. He lent over to pick it up, and knocked his drink over. I said, ‘Tim, you're the most completely useless person I've ever met.’ And he laughed, his booming great laugh.

“So that was Tim, Doing His Own Thing. Knocking over ashtrays.

“He told me that he thought the hippie movement was like the Romantic movement of the early 19th century. And that's what Tim is really: an old Romantic.”

Later I found out that Tim had been upset by this description, so I would like to amend the record now. Tim was not useless. He was a tireless fighter for justice, an inspiration to us all, a model of courage and conviction, funny, generous, honest and a truly decent person to boot. Having Tim chant the Awen over you was to be transported to another, better world.

He was only useless when it came to knocking over ashtrays.But actually, even this was endearing. I mean, no ashtray or cup or pint of beer was safe in his vicinity. But this was because he was always so engaged in conversation, so entranced by the person he was speaking to, that these ordinary objects just failed to hold his attention. So he would forget about them, and knock them over. It meant he cared more about people than he did about objects.

So here’s to you Tim, wherever you are. I’m sure you’ve already made a lot of new friends.

Following are two stories I wrote about Tim. The first is from the Guardian Weekend, featuring a certain pub in Bath. The second story is an excerpt from The Trials of Arthur, featuring a Morris Minor, a druid's staff, a young couple and too much alcohol.

That's a great tribute, Chris, and brought back many memories for me! I spent a lot of time with Tim because I always used to crash at his place in Bath. He often used to convince me that going there for some music event or recording was a great idea even if I found out that the gig had hardly been promoted and so there was hardly anyone who arrived. Another time I ended up in a free recording session at his friend Keith Lunt's recording studios and I remember that night because of how crazy it all got - there were a bunch of drunk buskers all wanting to do their own thing and one of them wouldn't shut up when I was trying to do mine! I got a couple of songs out of it though - and Real Love and Communication, which opens and closes the Green Man Festival CD was one of them and it features Tim, Keith and the drunken buskers on the Druid's Oath that starts it! But it didn't matter really if my visits to Bath weren't to plan because it was always a lot of fun and Tim was a great host! I also remember Tim from Avebury and the late Fred Frantic's garden parties in Chippenham! I treasure very fond memories of both Tim and Fred.

C.J., Tim became quite attached to your description of him as "the most completely useless person I have ever met" - often emmending it to "the most completely useless Druid". I think he saw it as a fine interpretation of "Secular" in the Secular Order of Druids. Others may claim to've been chosen as priest/ess by some deity or other, Tim was chosen, over and over again, by the people who made up the Order at any given festival. And Tim wasn't in charge, especially of ash trays, but provoked festivity and activism and reflection. We've lost a great man, but like Wally, he'll find a way to visit until his next incarnation.

TIm saved my life when I was homeless in Bath. He, Rob and Miranda housed me after I escaped from the Diddy Coys, and it was Tim that set me on the Bardic Path. I would not hold the Bardic Chair of Caer Abri now if it wasn't for Tim then. Sorely missed.

I would get a phone call;"Hi Pru, are you coming to the party, festival, gathering,bardic beer tasting evening, silly song session....?""Well erm..." I would mutter, as I mentally scrolled through my list of excuses not to go - I think there may be something good on the telly that night, or I was reserving that weekend to tidy my sock drawer.My caller continues.."Tim will be there""When does it start and how do I get there?" I reply without another moment's thought.

I'm going to miss that conversation. In fact I'm going to miss everything about Tim; his sense of humour, his "off the wall" approach to life, his creativity, his overwhelming presence and his booming laugh. Tim, of course, revelled in poking a rubber stick at cultural piety; I'm going to miss that too.

I'm not much of a big boy for the God stuff, but somehow I can picture Tim now sharing a table in paradise with Spike Milligan and Vivian Stanshell, scoffing forbidden fruit and playfully spitting out the pips at a picture of Tony Blair, while enjoying an intense conversation about making forbidden fruit cider. Save some for me when I get ther Tim, and dont put it in pewter tankards!

Well I shall see you all at the funeral, and later at the wake, where I shall raise a glass to Tim Sabastion - one of the most wonderful people I have ever met in my life.

One of many ribald evenings upstairs at the flat above Country Fayre in Bradford on Avon. Tim had read and lost The Book of Lies by Alastair Crowley, that states that on completion of reading, the book must be destroyed, otherwise it will disappear and dreadful things will happen. Well, Tim laughingly chirped that he didn't take much stock of such superstitious twaddle. A couple of Camberwell Carrots later Tim could be heard turning over the flat for a number of hours, crashes and bangs increasing in greater intensity than a police raid and a far worse mess. It was on the mantelpiece all the time. Tim collapsed exhausted on the voluptuous sofa that took up the greater part of the living room reflecting on the absurdity of superstition. The book remained on the mantelpiece and Tim went to bed.

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About Me

is a columnist and author with four books to his credit: Fierce Dancing (Faber & Faber 1996), Last of the Hippies (Faber & Faber 1999), Housing Benefit Hill (AK Press 2001) and The Trials of Arthur (with Arthur Pendragon, Element Books 2003). Columns have included Housing Benefit Hill and CJ Stone’s Britain in the Guardian Weekend, On The Edge in the Big Issue, On Another Planet in the Whitstable Times and Written In Stone in Prediction magazine. He is currently working on two new columns, and his latest book, the “biography” of a well-known supernatural being. He lives in Whitstable in the UK and, when not at his desk, is a part-time postman, which he describes as “like a four-hour workout every morning”. He is almost exactly 20,000 days old. See above for link to the website.